Puddles

Following from last weeks post I'm reminded of an incident that happened somewhere far more public.
I was working in a then busy nightclub. The place had floor to ceiling tinted glass walls that separated the VIP area from the main club. This allowed a much lower volume, options for private parties and a bit of anonymous people watching. The darkened windows however mislead one individual who had filled his bladder with beery evil.
He found a darkened corner in the crowded bar and thinking he was obstructed from every prying eye, undid his jeans and whipped his little fella out to water the corner. I was checking in with the bar-staff in the VIP and spotted the lads efforts out of the corner of my eye.
I checked his outfit and with a quick assistance call on the radio shot off out of the VIP, round the crowded bar and trying to track him down. I imagined he'd have finished his business by the time I'd gotten round the crowd to him. To my surprise and that of a colleague who'd joined me part way round he was still mid business.
I approached him from behind, tapped him on the shoulder and advised him to stop. He spun about, still mid flow and I tracked around keeping just back off his right shoulder. My colleague got his boots wet.
The pissing punter laughed at this and gave a little wiggle to finish the job. With his business concluded we told him to depart swiftly. He thought this most unfair. Now we know what had just been in his hands, some of it was on my friends boots, most of it was soaking into the hard wearing carpet. When he reached out to touch us, we both in sync knocked his hands away. He tried again, this time with fists. Probably cleaner but still not ones we fancied touching us. With some footwork he ended pressed up against the still wet glass with one of us on each shoulder. He really didn't get that it was time to give up so with an upper arm each, we escorted him to the nearest door. This did mean however going past the busy bar. Somewhere in the process he'd not re buttoned his jeans, as he kicked and stumbled in his futile efforts he did achieve the added humiliation of having first his arse, then his entire lower half down to his ankles on show. Strangely he didn't ask us to let him go to recover it, just kept struggling and thrashing out. Having spent his urine our patience he was deposited into the cold of the night where at least his member would appreciate the excuse. We departed before I think he'd even realised he was naked, he did realise he was angry but with only a locked firedoor while he shrank a little more.

Eyeball bleach

There are some things you just never need to see.
Getting an assist call to the ladies toilets is rarely a winner. Well that is unless it's to interrupt some cramped, dirty, sleazy romantic moment.
The usual is however when a female staff member, door bar or management, has found one unconscious. After announcing my entrance loudly and entering accompanied and slowly I enter and encounter the issue.
Now some ladies wake up, shake off their stupor, straighten themselves up and make their way out without problem. They're not usually the ones I get called to assist with.
I get the deeply unconscious. The ones covered in vomit. The one-shod wobblers. The piss soaked ones. The ones who've shit themselves. The larger ones wedged under the bowl. These all require patience, respect of modesty and a strong stomach.
When the only thing the female doorstaff spots is a pair of shoe soles sticking out from under the door, I get a call. This could be white powder sniffing so my colleague meets me at the door and describes the situation. We enter together, still no change in the situation. She pops the lock with her bolt sliding tool. The door opens inwards so she firmly opens it and bounces it off a buttock. A large naked buttock. This causes to slumpfurther the kneeling, firmly unconscious, knickers 'round knees, arse in the air, loo-roll stuck to thigh, face on the seat, vomit strewn, hair in the bowl partied out lady. My colleague hoicks down her belt/dress to cover most of here bare rear, grabs the back of her hair and tries to rouse her. This has limited effect. She's not enough strength in her arms to lift herself off the bowl and not enough control of her legs to get them under her heft in the restricted space.
Neither I nor my smaller footed workmate could get past her. Neither of us wanted to particularly get our hands, shirts, trousers and shoes dirty trying a clumsy lift. With a lot of shoving, pulling and twisting we got her sitting next to the bowl. From there we could get on either side, lift her with a hand each in her sweaty arm-pits. Once upright she began to recover and after washing her hands, face and cleavage clear of obvious chunks of vom and establishing control again over her shoes she was good to go. Slowly and carefully out the ladies room, out the nearest exit, down a short flight of steps and into the fresh air. We left her under the distant observation of the front door team and went back in to thoroughly scrub with soap, water and as much alcohol rub as we can get out of the staff-room dispenser. I still felt like I stank all the rest of the shift and way home. Put me right off my special burger.
According to the front door team, she sobered up, stole a few slices of pizza from a passer by and then jumped the taxi queue and was gone into the night.
The image as the door opened is however is not something I'll ever be able to get out of my mind without some strong mind bleach.

Too Late

I'm always amazed how many folk bow to a faceless invisible authority. The Milgram experiment showed the extent of this but every night I work I can see the effects.
If I refuse someone for being barred, too drunk, inappropriately dressed or even for the club being too full, I can expect grief. When I say they can't come in because it's a student night and they aren't students, they'll often give me grief.
What is surprising is that when I tell a group they can't come in because the licence on the premises says so, they don't give me grief. The licencing laws say I can't admit drunks, that never stops them whining on. It seems the impression of a faceless authority, under which we all apparently toil, is sufficient to suppress the whining and aggravation that usually accompanies a refusal.
This 'too late to let in' reasoning doesn't mention the fact we'll be serving for another 45 minutes or more or the fact we'll be banging out tunes for nearly an hour and a half. More than enough time to find the love of your drunken night and get more than a pair of drinks down your throat.
It doesn't seem to matter, if the authority behind the scenes says no, people accept it. Even drunk and potentially troublesome people accept it. Once in a blue moon the authorities will be on the premises. Even everyday they'd be very unlikely to notice one or two late entering punters but the mere suggestion that this faceless, usually limbless body says no is enough.
Not surprisingly the excuse is used as soon as we're towards the dregs of the night to dispense with unwanteds. Very effective if a little naughty but riding the coat-tails of the all powerful disembodied power sometimes makes up for some of the convoluted, arcane, pointless things in the law that grind with me.

Earlier every Year

It's happening already. Normally reserved 'til the snowy and frozen months of winter, this autumn, before bonfire night, before the start of November even. Some hilarious drinker has asked if they can borrow/have/steal my hat.
This was the first night I felt I had to wear it. It was cool and one hell of a wind was blowing through town. I've been wearing the big coat, gloves and hats for many years. My head gets cold due to my follicularly challenged male pattern absence of hairdo. I wear a hat, a simple, unbranded, knitted black hat.
Every year I'm asked time and again by punters both drunk and sober if they can take this essential part of my kit. The answer is the same as my answer to drunken ladies who suggest I swap my comfy boots for their painfully impractical tiny, pointy, high heeled hell shoes.
"NO!"
This year it's just too early and I'll be hearing it for four or five months to come. Oh well, at least I'm warm, so far.

Hungry Bum

The cold weather has not prevented the lovely local ladies wearing very little.
The motif of the season seems to be sequins, a splash of neon and leggings. If not in leggings then it's tights, bright patterned or fishnet. The fashion faux pas' this season seem to be showing the band at the top of the tights beneath skirts or shorts and leggings that cling to every curve.
It's been cameltoes and mooseknuckles in all the long nights.
The shiny pattern leggings bring only two things to mind, box rot and two seals wrestling on a beach.
On ladies who don't know their size or just don't care you can see their hungry bums eat their leggings until I can see their every intimate contour highlighted in shiny black or silver. Not a good look for any night out.
On a rare occasion I have to give out the "badly packed sausage of the evening" to a lady who combines all manner of wardrobe malfunctions. From the dark roots under straightened straw like blonde hair. Heavy tan with shiny light coloured lips looking like a bad negative. The neon asymmetric top with grey bra over the naked shoulder. The top coming too short on the torso with a pale white dunlap over the top of the sequined shorts. The hungry bum eating the hot pants into a scrunched up sequined thong and leaving the thick band at the top of the tights bisecting a showing buttock before the rest of the fishnet glory looking like a highly patterned garrote leading down to the high heeled high ankled, platform boot. These take the small well painted toenails and make them look like pigs trotters.
A worthy winner of the badly packed sausage of the night award. Messy and serially minging for a lady who last season scrubbed up rather than scrubbered up. "Saucer of milk to the front door"

Blindingly useless

This relates to something that happened a good while back but has needed a little distance and patience before posting.

One evening, on the door of a very busy bar, myself and 2 colleagues refused a gent. He was intoxicated and on refusal became very aggressive. He took on a fighting stance, I'd say amateur boxing not mixed marshal arts or anything that might kick. He swore a fair bit and then lunged in with a jab. Aimed at the doorman in the middle, not me in this instance. The lad on the far side shoved him off course, he missed the lad in the middle and I bounced him back out into the centre and away from the doorstep. My mate who'd been swung at was a little irate, the gent took another lunge at him. My colleague struck him, open handed, in the top of the chest. The drunk did a complete reverse in direction and fell backwards, onto his arse.
He got up and swore a whole load more, made some lovely threats and then on spying two high vis wearing members of the police accused us in a very loud tone of beating him up. The police invited him over the road and heard how he'd been punched, kicked and thrown onto the floor.
All of this had been done by my colleague, "yes officers, the one in the centre with the blond hair".
All of that is fairly common in this line of work. What's not is one of the officers, a sergeant, walking over, establishing the blond ones name and then arresting him. He called for a back up unit to whisk my colleague away. They did not ask to hear our evidence, they did not ask to see the ample CCTV. They did not ask if we were busy, they did not ask if this doorstaff's presence was necessary or more importantly if their absence invalidated any insurance or fire safety controls. They did not ask to see the doorman's licence and thus have full access to his criminal record and address details.
They lifted him off the door and went back to take a more formal statement from the drunk to support the allegation of assault. The chap in the van was more than a little pissed off, I was more than a little pissed off. The manager was more than a little pissed off. When the manager approached and asked if they would like to see the CCTV, he was told to go away. When he asked if he could expect the chap back that evening to finish the job he was paying him for he got told to go away or get nicked too.
The end of this story is long and pointless. The doorman was eventually charged, having not taken a caution. The case went to court, the CPS provided no case, he was cleared of the charges. The action against the officer for wrongful arrest was settled. All of this taking over 12 months.

All of it could have taken less than 12 minutes if he's asked to see the tape, 12 seconds if he'd have checked the badge, written down the details after checking the photo matched. He'd still be there at the end of the night, even if he vanished the club would have some contact with him, even if they weren't cooperating the SIA hold enough identifying evidence to get an arrest warrant. No need to pull him in on the say of a violent aggressive drunk.
If my colleague had hit him without restraint, without good grounds for fear of injury, without regard for the possible risks then perhaps a more front foot approach would be required from the boys in blue.

This is atypical, most officers we meet are professional, competent and pragmatic. Some are not.

Slow Working

I've had a very slow weekend. One lass with an ID that really wasn't hers. One lass lost her handbag and then we found it again. One lad rejected for being far too stoned. One lass emptying her stomach contents on the front step and again just along the street. Smelly but tedious.
I tend not to grumble too much when its non stop, when its non start I'm just gonna stay a grumbling grumpy man with too much time to dwell upon the unachieved, the unattempted and the unattainable.